SCI­ENCE SAYS: PUT A PIN IN IT

All the talk about merid­i­ans and chakras may make you won­der: is acupunc­ture for real? Well, it is, ac­cord­ing to a new study from LA BioMed, a US non-profit re­search or­gan­i­sa­tion. When you get pricked, the skin re­leases nitric ox­ide, a gas that im­proves cir­cu­la­tion. “This al­lows a flush of anal­gesic or sen­si­tis­ing sub­stances, which con­trib­ute to ben­e­fits like pain re­lief,” says Dr Sheng-Xing Ma, the lead au­thor. Us­ing a heat­ing pad af­ter­wards fur­ther in­creases the re­lease of nitric ox­ide.